AS SSD Benchmark and the CrystalDiskMark for Crucial M4

So, I have decided to go the full SSD route after all.
Below are the AS SSD Benchmark and the CrystalDiskMark for my new M4:




I have 2 remarks:
The AS SSD Benchmark access time is quite high.
Performance is good but not much better than the Hybrid Momentus XT it replaced. Boot time is about the same at around 25 seconds.

Do you think it is a Windows 7 problem or a prob with the drive?

 

No, no problem - that is just how good the XT is though - SSD's are mostly over-rated as I've been saying for a few yrs - 'snappiness' does not equal 'performance' as you're seeing first hand.

Are you running the latest Intel RST 10.6 drivers?

Are you running the latest 009 Firmware?

Are you running on 'High Performance' mode instead of 'Balanced' and are you plugged in?

Is this a clean install of Win7? Are all the drivers (chipset, audio, video, lan, etc.) all up-to-date?

You could try the JBB tweaks, but if you do, don't expect the same battery life from your system.

Good luck.

 

64 GB M4 doesn't equal a lot of performance. Read up on memory channels.

 

Are you running the latest Intel RST 10.6 drivers?
I don't think so. What device do they control in Device Manager?

Are you running the latest 009 Firmware?
Yes.

Are you running on 'High Performance' mode instead of 'Balanced' and are you plugged in?
Yes, I am always plugged in. l'll set it on "High Performance".

Is this a clean install of Win7? Are all the drivers (chipset, audio, video, lan, etc.) all up-to-date?
Yes X 2.

You could try the JBB tweaks, but if you do, don't expect the same battery life from your system.
I'll check it out.

 

My BIOS doesn't give me the option of RAID or AHCI settings, which, as I understand it, are needed for the installation of this driver.

 

The line iaStor - OK in the AS SSD Benchmark seems to indicate that my M4 is already using the Intel RST driver. What do you think?

 

It may be using a version of IRST, but that doesn't mean it's the latest version - Intel RST controls SATA drives (if your chipset supports this driver).

And as rightly pointed out by Bill Nye; the 64GB models all fall short as far as (storage subsystem) performance goes, compared to the larger capacity/fully populated channel models.

You may want to give the Intel RST drivers a try (if your chipset doesn't support them, they simply won't install...):

See:
http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Detail_Desc.aspx?ProductID=2101&DwnldID=20215&lang=eng&iid=dc_rss

 

Thanks.

I installed it and I got an improvement in the read speed but a dramatic decrease in the write speed.




However, it cut about 4 seconds in the boot time, which is great.

 

Yeah, real world 'feel' with the latest Intel RST drivers is always better than what the benchmark 'scores' report.

You may want to try booting into safe mode to see what the 'scores' are there - it should definitely be a much better 'score' than normal Windows mode.

Btw, you are not running anything like bitlocker or truecrypt by any chance?

You may also want to try running CDM at 3x 50MB too instead of 5x 1000MB (to reduce wear and tear on your SSD).

 

Because of the writing screw up, I decided to uninstall the Intel RST 10.6 drivers. The system then installed its own drivers as per the following shot:



I then got the following - much better - results:




And the boot time now is even faster! Go figure.

Any comments?

 

OTOH, I started w/the XT and became quite disillusioned. Where the XT didn't do-it-for-me was in Lightroom processing 15+ Megapix RAW images when switching from image to image and especially zooming to 100%. Sequential reads of large files was no faster than a typical 7200rpm drive. Even with a i7-720qm and all 8 CPUs showing good usages (as lightroom will fully utilize all the cores) I would find myself twiddling my thumb for seconds after every action w/the harddrive light showing it was churning away. I didn't spend all the money I had on that machine to wait. The M4 will prove to have significant improvements in the user experience in that case.

 

Unless it's a repetitive task where you give time to the 4gb SSD to "cache" some instructions, there is no difference between the XT and other 7200 rpm mechanical HDD's. Booting and loading applications are great examples because the same files are loaded every time.
Before buying The XT, someone has to consider these facts and realize its limitations.

 

Each RAW is about 15 - 20 Meg. The hope was that they would get cached in the SSD portion and benefits would be seen in those reads [and I was hoping, writes of the workfiles] as I went back and forth between a few of them. Alas, no, I had it wrong.

 

m8o,

I agree that Lightroom seems light-years behind on a mechanical HDD - even one as advanced as the XT Hybrid.

Lightroom simply soars with an SSD (it is, after all, a database driven program).

To be fair though, I did optimally setup my HDD's for photoediting work and sustained (high) performance too and did not see the large delays you mention with your XT experience (vs. my desktop vRaptors at the time).

See:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/har...-hitachi-7k500-benchmark-setup-specifics.html


As also seen in the following link, the right setup does make a difference in the performance of the same/identical/similar hardware.

See:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/sol...le-copy-result-hdds-ssds-easy-comparison.html


(Note that the identically setup/partitioned mechanical HDD's, Hitachi and XT, are posting much higher 'scores' than identical HDD setup with the 'defaults' - higher than even an SSD too...).